The S. A. Andrée Hydrogen Balloon Disaster

In 1897, Swedish explorer S.A. Andrée set out to fly a hydrogen balloon over the North Pole. Alongside Knut Frænkel and Nils Strindberg, he launched The Eagle (or the Ornen) into the freezing unknown. Less than three days later, they were fighting for their lives on shifting pack ice.
​In this episode, we examine the reasons behind the expedition, the design of the balloon, how the money was raised and the harrowing discovery over 30 years after the crew were last seen — including the frozen diaries and camera film that finally told the world what happened to Andrée,  Frænkel and Strindberg.

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Transcript

Speaker 1 0:00

It was the 11th of July 1897. On a desolate ice fringe island in the Arctic Circle, three men climbed into the wicker basket of the massive hydrogen-filled balloon. At the turn of the 20th century, Arctic exploration was the ultimate test of human endurance and adventurous spirit. All we knew was that it was a brutal, uncharted world of frostbite and wooden ships trapped and crushing pack ice. But Salomon August Andrée wasn't bothered by that. Salomon was a man of the modern industrial age, and he believed technology could conquer nature, and he questioned why men should trudge over the unforgiving ice when they could simply fly right over it. And so, the three-man crew smiled and waved as on the shore the crowd of family, friends, and excited well-wishers cheered them on. The balloon is released and she starts to drift out over the dark grey sea. But almost immediately things go wrong. Their basket drops and skims the Arctic water. In a frantic bid to gain height, the men begin to offload ballast. Soon, at the mercy of the biting cold wind, they are airborne. But at what cost? The balloon is driven north, up high and away from the view of their audience, and often to the blinding white unknown. And then silence for thirty three years. Join us as we follow S. A. Andrée into the sky and towards the undiscovered land of ice and snow at the top of the world. I'm Steve, he's Neil, and this is Honourable Mentions Honourable Mentions. Hello listener. How are you? What are you up to? Just chilling? I hope you've got your warmest of warm coats to hand because we're gonna throw plenty of snow and ice at your already chilled self today. But before we do, let's welcome on board everyone's favourite snuggle buddy, a great big warm wet blanket of a man. Hello, Neil Hello Stevie. Would you like to ride in my beautiful balloon? Would you like to ride in my beautiful balloon? We could float among the stars together, you and I, for we can fly. We can fly. No, I haven't lost my senses. I am of course performing Up Up and Away by Fifth Dimension.

Speaker 1 2:48

What ever. Have you ever rode in a beautiful balloon, please?

Speaker 2 2:51

No, I haven't. No, I've had such a busy week. I haven't had chance to ride in a bluetiful balloon.

Speaker 1 2:56

A Bluetiful Balloon?

Speaker 2 2:57

Yes. There's a new version.

Speaker 1 2:59

Oh is it? It's the remix.

Speaker 2 3:01

Yeah.

Speaker 1 3:01

Salomon August Andrée, please Neil.

Speaker 2 3:04

Didn't he release a song called Mysterious Girl?

Speaker 1 3:06

No, you're thinking of his sister, Peter.

Speaker 2 3:09

Oh, right, okay, yeah. Yeah, the Greek looking fellow.

Speaker 1 3:12

This is Salomon August Andrée, or Gus, I don't know how you say Andrée. He was born in the small town of Granna in Sweden on the 18th of October 1854. A long time ago then. So just before seven o'clock. I don't know whether that ties in with his sister Peter Andre or whether she was his granddaughter. I don't know. But he was born to Jacobina Andrée, or Mina, for short. And Claes or Claes for short.

Speaker 2 3:44

Jacobina.

Speaker 1 3:45

Probably pronounced Jacobina. Got some sort of problem with that.

Speaker 2 3:49

Yeah, it sounds sounds like a fruity drink.

Speaker 1 3:51

Everything sounds like a fruity drink for you. If I said, I don't know, it's a bit random, something like umbongo, you'd say it sounds like a fruity drink.

Speaker 2 3:59

Steve, that is a fruity drink.

Speaker 1 4:02

As a child, Salomon was exceptionally close to his mother, especially following the death of Claes in 1870.

Speaker 2 4:10

Oh no.

Speaker 1 4:11

Do you reckon if we say umbongo enough times we'd get a crate sent to us, a free crate of its juicy goodness?

Speaker 2 4:17

Well, I haven't seen it in the shops for a long while, so I don't know if it's still available.

Speaker 1 4:21

Umbongo. It must be around. They drink it in the congo.

Speaker 2 4:26

I know they do, yeah.

Speaker 1 4:28

Way down deep in the middle of the congo, a gorilla took an apricot, a guava and a mango, he put them all together and he danced a dainty tango. I know, he said, we'll call it umbongo. Was it a gorilla or was it a hippo? I can't remember.

Speaker 2 4:41

I don't know.

Speaker 1 4:43

Um bongo, Um bongo, they drink it in the congo. Go back near, please, seems you've sidetracked me, to Solomon. He was a clever and practically minded lad. He went on to attend the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, which we'll find is in Sweden, earning a degree in mechanical engineering in 1874, when he was but twenty.

Speaker 2 5:08

That's quite a good degree to have when you're twenty.

Speaker 1 5:11

This isn't it. Two years later, Salomon travelled to the United States, which again is a real country. He would have been twenty-two. I don't know twenty plus two is.

Speaker 2 5:25

Thank you.

Speaker 1 5:26

Here he attended the Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia.

Speaker 2 5:31

Can I just say how clever I am? Centennial means a hundred years.

Speaker 1 5:34

That's right. And he went to Philadelphia as a Swede, so he didn't go there to West Philadelphia to be born and raised on a playground. Where he spent most of his days. In fact, he didn't spend most of his days on a playground. He spent most of his days at the first official World's Fair held in the United States.

Speaker 2 5:57

Was he chilling out maxing relaxing and shooting some b-ball outside of school? Yeah.

Speaker 1 6:03

No.

Speaker 2 6:04

Huh.

Speaker 1 6:04

Running from May the 10th to November the 10th, it celebrated the 100th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence and welcomed around 10 million visitors. Which is a roaring success. By anybody's reckoning, Neil.

Speaker 2 6:22

Definitely if they just charge them a pound each to get in, that's a that's ten million pounds.

Speaker 1 6:27

Well done. That's very good. Thank you. Perhaps they must charge them dollars in their own currency. Here, Salomon found work as a janitor at the event's Swedish pavilion.

Speaker 2 6:40

Was he a mild mannered janitor?

Speaker 1 6:44

Yeah, but some lots of TV references.

Speaker 2 6:48

Yeah.

Speaker 1 6:49

He could be. On this trip, he met an American balloonist called John Wise. Wise had been building balloons since before Andrée was born. And back in 1859, he'd revolutionized the American postal system by inventing the very first balloon to carry mail.

Speaker 2 7:11

Did he make it into the shape of a basket? Because I know like these balloonists they can do things like dogs and puppies and stuff, don't you? You see them at kids' parties and they can make hats and swords and everything else like that at balloons. Yeah, they're balloonists, aren't they?

Speaker 1 7:26

Yeah. No, not the sort of balloonists we're talking about.

Speaker 2 7:29

Oh, okay.

Speaker 1 7:30

Now Neil. Hello Neil Hello. Carrying mail by balloon may seem a bit quaint and rickety now. But taking to the skies up up and away in a beautiful balloon was cutting its technology in the mid-19th century. The meeting with John Wise sparked a lifelong fascination with aeronautics and balloon travel with young Salomon August Andrée, and he began to read widely on trade winds and balloon engineering.

Speaker 2 8:03

Balloon engineering? Told you, he ties animals out of them.

Speaker 1 8:06

I went out with a girl and she was Dutch, and she used to blow up balloons and make them into footwear. She popped her clogs. Solomon August Andrée takes a bit of saying, do you not agree?

Speaker 2 8:31

No.

Speaker 1 8:33

So his friends called him S.A. or just Andrée. I think we know him well enough now to consider him our friend, so we should be polite and we're going to call him S.A or Andrée from now on. So it's about the same person. I can go with that. Following his time on a playground in Pennsylvania, shooting some people outside of school, our mate Andrée returned to Sweden and opened a machine shop where he worked until 1880 because it proved to be a bit of a dud. Then he held down a few jobs, including taking part in a Swedish scientific expedition to Spitzberger, an island in Norway's Arctic Svalbard archipelago. You try saying this thought when you're sorry. Where he was responsible for observations of air electricity.

Speaker 2 9:23

Air electricity?

Speaker 1 9:25

Air electricity. Yes, whatever.

Speaker 2 9:29

Electricity. So you're talking about wind farms and stuff like that.

Speaker 1 9:33

Lightning. Something like that. Okay. Maybe he should have gone back and listened to some of our previous episodes and got friendly with Mr. Sullivan, who was struck by lightning seven times in his lifetime. And if the listener is listening and wonder what we're talking about, you can go back and listen to that, if you wish, listener. It's a very good episode about a poor old fella who just couldn't help but being struck by lightning wherever he went. Eventually, in 1885, Andrée found employment with the Swedish Patent Office where he remained for the rest of his life.

Speaker 2 10:07

Well, he must have enjoyed it then, mustn't he?

Speaker 1 10:10

He also found time to become a liberal member of the Stockholm City Council, and as a scientist, he published journals on air electricity, conduction of heat, and various new inventions. Perhaps I should talk to him about my inventions. Don't, please. Sorry? I know of your inventions, and most of them are vulgar.

Speaker 2 10:36

It's not vulgar. It'd be a very, very handy piece of kit for people that struggle to wipe their bottom.

Speaker 1 10:42

S.A. entirely lacked interest for anything like the arts or sports or literature or Love Island or collecting old copies of Razzle. Pierne for social history, of course.

Speaker 2 10:55

Is that why you've got yours?

Speaker 1 10:57

No comment. He was a believer in industry and technology and said that the emancipation of women would come as a consequence of technical progress. Which he was working on so they could thank him later.

Speaker 2 11:12

Perhaps he can work on technical process and how you can open up some of your old razzle because the pages are all sticky and stuck together.

Speaker 1 11:19

No comment. While Andrée was busy saving all women, although very slowly, he was approached in March 1894 by a renowned Swedish polar explorer by the name of Adolf Erik Nordenskiand, who said that he had an idea for a jolly wheeze.

Speaker 2 11:38

Jolly wheeze, is that when you put something at the end of your tinkle and when you go for a whee it makes you laugh? Do you do that? Yeah, of course you can do that, yeah.

Speaker 1 11:46

Okay, this isn't some sort of confessional. He was heading off on another of his Arctic trips, and this time, rather than spending weeks and weeks shoveling ships out of the pack ice, how about getting close enough and then doing the rest with some chaps in a tethered balloon who could observe what lay beyond. Andrée thought for a moment, encountered with the idea of an untethered balloon. Untethered balloon. In fact, no, he said, instead of a ship, why not use a balloon for the whole of the expedition? Ships were too slow, they took weeks, if not months, to reach their destination, and then they invented ice for years on end. For example, in eighteen forty-five he said that an expedition led by the British explorer Sir John Franklin, no less than a hundred and twenty-nine men and two ships had simply disappeared into the ice.

Speaker 2 12:42

Wow.

Speaker 1 12:43

But by this stage a wide-eyed and slightly panicked Adolf Eric had backed out of the room and was screeching his tyres off Andrée's driveway.

Speaker 2 12:52

He's thinking to himself, I'm on my toes here.

Speaker 1 12:55

Nevertheless, by August 1895, the idea was fully formed in Andrée's mind, so he packed a suitcase and travelled off to London in one of those ships he'd been slagging off.

Speaker 2 13:07

Did he make it out of his balloons?

Speaker 1 13:09

He's a hypocrite, isn't he? No, Neil, you need to forget this making things out of balloons. That's not the kind of balloonist he was. He was a up and away, my beautiful balloon hot air balloonist with a basket underneath.

Speaker 2 13:25

All right, I'll let the balloons go.

Speaker 1 13:28

I don't let them go. Never see them again. Just push them under the table.

Speaker 2 13:34

Whatever.

Speaker 1 13:35

In London he presented his plan to a geographical congress. Full of enthusiasm he picked up his idea and banged on about the dangers of sending more ships to explore the Arctic. That makes sense. Fellow adventurers were out mapping every continent on Earth, deserts and jungles were dangerous, for they had revealed oases and mighty rivers and hitherto uncontacted tribes. But the Arctic, as far as anybody knew, was simply a barren field of gigantic blocks of ice, only navigable at certain times of the year, with the remainder being too cold and too dark. But what if there was more? No one had revealed the secrets of the Arctic, so they don't really know what was there at all. And so here he was, S.A. Andrée, proposing the solution. I need to act this bit out here, Neil. So what I can do, because this is what you said in real life, okay?

Speaker 2 14:32

Yeah.

Speaker 1 14:32

So I'll act it and then maybe afterwards you can give us the translation of how he said it in Swedish.

Speaker 2 14:40

I'll do my best.

Speaker 1 14:41

If you used Swedish. I presume you can speak Swedish.

Speaker 2 14:44

Yeah.

Speaker 1 14:45

Yeah, I thought so. Right, so he he might be slightly nervous. I don't know. He's full of confidence, though, isn't he? So I'm gonna project him as as full of confidence. He's a Swede and he's giving this talk to these these well-to-do gentlemen of power and influence in the field where he is practicing. Although while they're in a field, I thought they'd been in a office.

Speaker 2 15:11

Oh, certainly. Well, they're doing in the field, they thought there was an office.

Speaker 1 15:14

I don't know. It was Victorian times, I probably had invented homes and things. But he's in a field. Anyway. Um well we need not pursue the investigation very far to discover such a means. Once that appears to be creative for the purpose in question. I refer to the balloon. How was that? Thank you, listen. Thank you, thank you. Anyway, Neil, would you like to translate that into the Swedish, please?

Speaker 2 15:59

Basically he says was touch mesh about with ships, just do this with the balloons. And that means Stop sodden about with these bloody ships, let's crack on with balloons, pal.

Speaker 1 16:12

Okay, thank you. Andrée estimated that the balloon would need to carry three men. Enough food and drink, some scientific instruments, a camera to document the adventure, an emergency sled, weapons and ammunition to defend themselves if necessary, several homing pigeons, and of course, cowboy chaps in three rainbow string vests. In case they land in the middle of a lost Arctic tribe while they're celebrating Pride Week.

Speaker 2 16:44

Well, that makes sense, but it's a good estimate, isn't it? Estimated he needs three men. Didn't say we need three, it was just an estimate, so you could probably end up with just one.

Speaker 1 16:52

Well, let's see, shall we? He reckoned they would reach the North Pole within forty three hours of take off and travel at an altitude of two hundred and fifty meters, or eight hundred and twenty feet, which was enough to be below the clouds, but high enough to be above the frozen fog. The whole journey would take around thirty days.

Speaker 2 17:15

Now, the sceptic in me on this bit, Stephen, is they didn't know where the North Pole was, so how do you know it's going to take them that long to get there?

Speaker 1 17:23

They didn't know where the North Pole was, they just hadn't been there.

Speaker 2 17:26

Well, how do you know where it is if you haven't been there? If no one's been there before, how'd you know where it is?

Speaker 1 17:30

You ever heard the term the magnetic North Pole? And you've ever heard compasses. I don't mean used for drawing circles on paper. I mean the sort of type of compasses that give you directions.

Speaker 2 17:43

Yeah, but they still don't know exactly where it is, do you? You can walk past it. There's no pole there, is there, unless there is a is there a red and white stripe of pole there?

Speaker 1 17:50

No, no, Neil. No, no. You're getting confused with your brain of reality again.

Speaker 2 17:55

There's a I suppose Santa would be there, wouldn't he?

Speaker 1 17:59

Santa would have been there. That's a very good point well made. And they had the compass, so they knew which way the pole was. It was to the north. w

Speaker 2 18:12

Oh, so if they walk past it, it th the thing will spin round and go back again, so they'd be like, this is exactly where it is.

Speaker 1 18:19

But I think it's it's not like a like a singular point, like a ballse in a dark ball. It's quite a wide area.

Speaker 2 18:27

Is it?

Speaker 1 18:27

It's the magnetic north, yes.

Speaker 2 18:30

Oh, right, so it could be like a mile radius or something.

Speaker 1 18:33

I don't know, I've never been. Have you no, obviously you've never been.

Speaker 2 18:37

I've been several times.

Speaker 1 18:38

Have you?

unknown 18:39

Yeah.

Speaker 1 18:40

So are you asking these questions then?

Speaker 2 18:42

Because I want to know that make sure that you're given the facts.

Speaker 1 18:45

Oh, I see, thank you. Thank you for keeping it up. Although unimaginably calm, the Arctic was a stable temperature, which meant that the balloon wouldn't be subject to the same changes in elevation it would usually be, because blings is the warmer and the colder the airflow, uh hot air bloom could go up and it can go down according to the airflow surrounding it, you see. And what they're saying here is it tend to be more of a steady temperature. And travelling at the peak of the Arctic summer meant that the sun would always be shining and they'd be able to navigate without pause. Of course, the midnight sun would also allow them to document everything with their camera, and at last, the vast unknown expanse on the roof of the world will be a mystery no more.

Speaker 2 19:35

No more. Wow. That's interesting, isn't it? Because there's lots of stories about what's there, isn't there?

Speaker 1 19:42

Is there Neil? Can you relate one of your stories, please?

Speaker 2 19:45

Well, there's um there's stories that there's fairies. Is there? There's stories that there's dancing dolphins. Is there? Well, this is in my head. Um and there's also stories of a big Amazon warehouse. Is there? Yeah.

Speaker 1 20:02

In the North Pole? Yeah. Well, an Amazon warehouse entirely staffed by dancing dolphins and fairies.

Speaker 2 20:09

No, don't be silly being silly now. No, there's a North Pole that there's an Amazon warehouse there that's Santa feeds into it, you see.

Speaker 1 20:17

Oh. Yeah. That's how Jeff Bezos makes all his money then. He's got Santa held to a monopoly.

Speaker 2 20:26

Yeah, he's got Santa tied down most of the evening. But people say he's sleeping, he's not. He's tied to a chair and being beaten. Hello, Neil. Hello, Stephen, please.

Speaker 1 20:37

Can you please explain for me and the listener what the guide ropes and drag ropes are on a hot air balloon, please?

Speaker 2 20:46

Yes, well guide ropes are the ropes that guide you along. Other ropes are used for rope things, tying things down and etcetera. What are the ropes you're saying about, please? I've got guide ropes, can't remember the rest. Drag ropes. Drag ropes is they drag them behind um so they don't go too far and they can see how far they are away from the earth then by measuring it. And what's the next one? That was it. Oh well there you go then. See?

Speaker 1 21:12

Okay. Well, thank you. Guide ropes or drop lines, if you're in the biz, are lightweight ropes attached to the basket. They are dropped to the ground crew during takeoff landing or low altitude manoeuvres to safely guide and pull the blue. They should be handled in low wind conditions and must be used with caution to avoid getting tangled in trees or power lines. Which is pretty much what you said.

Speaker 2 21:43

Yeah, girl guides do it, don't they? That's why they're called guide ropes.

Speaker 1 21:46

Drag ropes are ropes that are dressed up as females. No. Drag ropes are long, heavy ropes that drag on the ground. If your balloon is rising too quickly, the crew can haul. More of the heavy rope into the basket to create ballast. Likewise, if you're descending too fast, let out some rope, lighten the basket, and let the ground take some of your weight. That's what I said. Hish. Now, to round off his genius proposal, Andrée told his audience with a final flourish that there was nothing for a guide rope to get caught on in the vast icy plains of the Arctic. It was a risk free mission. He'd got it all worked out, hadn't he? But there's never been before, so how does he know this? Well, that's a very good question. That's no one countered with. As it happens, Andrée's Hot Air Bloom Dream came that's a good name for an album. Hot air balloon dream. Well it would have been in the sort of 1980s synth area for people like isn't Jean Michel Jar. He should have had an album called that. As it happens, Andrée's hot air balloon dream came at the perfect time. Sweden's King Oscar II had a strong desire for his country to win the race for the North Pole, and he was convinced Andrée was just the man to deliver it. Good old S.A. had put the cost of his expedition at 38,000 Swedish kroner. But the eventual total came in at 130,800 Swedish krona. Swedish, Swedish krona.

Speaker 2 23:32

That sounds about right, didn't it? It's like building projects over here.

Speaker 1 23:35

Neil, using your mathematics.

Speaker 2 23:38

Yes, please.

Speaker 1 23:39

130,800 Swedish krona back then is worth how much in US dollars today.

Speaker 2 23:52

In US dollars? Um two point five million. No. One million.

Speaker 1 24:00

One million, listener. Straight in there. Yes, one million US dollars today, or around ten million Swedish krona today. The project was met with immense national pride in Sweden, leading to a massive rush of high profile financial backing. The three largest contributors were ABBA. No, they didn't put in anything. Didn't they? And put in a bloody thing. What about IKEA? No.

Speaker 2 24:31

They see they give it all this face, don't they?

Speaker 1 24:33

Not on me all. Coming in at number three. 230,000 US dollars today. And a stupendous amount of money. Let's wait to do number one. Oh, that's great. The same amount again. The rest of the funding came from public donations and the backing of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. And I'm surprised you didn't mention those in your guesses. But Abba was a good guess. No, they didn't even bother putting hands in their pockets, mate.

Speaker 2 26:04

Didn't he go say, look, come on, money, money, money. See what did there?

Speaker 1 26:07

Yeah.

Speaker 2 26:08

He said, I need to do this. I need to do this expedition because the winner takes it all. So that's good, isn't it?

Speaker 1 26:13

Take a chance on me. Gimme, gimme, gimme. Lay all your love on me. I have a dream.

Speaker 2 26:22

Unbelievable.

Speaker 1 26:23

I know. There's loads of them.

Speaker 2 26:25

Brilliant.

Speaker 1 26:26

Or tell you what, Neil.

Speaker 2 26:28

What?

Speaker 1 26:29

If they did manage to get away into the North Pole and come back again, they'd have proven themselves to be some rather super troopers.

Speaker 2 26:38

Super troopers.

Speaker 1 26:40

There's lots and lots there.

Speaker 2 26:42

That's what it sounded like, how you said it.

Speaker 1 26:43

I know, that's why I said it like that, you see.

Speaker 2 26:45

Yeah. That's how you speak.

Speaker 1 26:47

The biggest single expense was the custom-built hydrogen balloon itself, named Örnen, or the Eagle in English, which cost 36,000 krona on its own, nearly 30% of the entire budget.

Speaker 2 27:03

He could have used the King's money for that, couldn't he?

Speaker 1 27:06

He could have done, couldn't he? But what was he doing? His first pitch was thirty-eight grand. It's thirty-six just for the balloon. It was made from three layers of white, high quality, lacquered Chinese silk.

Speaker 2 27:19

That's the best silk.

Speaker 1 27:20

Construction was done in Paris or Paris, using protective coatings to make it waterproof. The blooms also outfitted with heavy guide ropes to be used for steering and speed control, which we've spoken about, haven't we, guide ropes?

Speaker 2 27:35

Yes, we did.

Speaker 1 27:35

Yes. And once completed, it was so large it had to be specially transferred with the help of the British Royal Navy.

Speaker 2 27:43

Yeah, I see. We have to get involved somewhere, don't we? Let's bring in the best when they need it.

Speaker 1 27:47

Well we've cocked up here.

Speaker 2 27:48

Yeah, we need to bring in the best. Let's get the boys in.

Speaker 1 27:50

Or the British in, they'll sort of say. Once delivered, the Örnen was stored in a special balloon house five stories high, where it could be safely inflated. She was a modern marvel and a sight to be seen.

Speaker 2 28:04

Can I just say someone must have been a visionary because you've had to build a house just ready for balloons just in case balloons were going to be invented? Because they put it into a special balloon house.

Speaker 1 28:15

I imagine they built the house this storage unit or balloon house for the balloon.

Speaker 2 28:21

Oh, someone just built a house and thought one day there'll be a balloon in here.

Speaker 1 28:25

No.

Speaker 2 28:26

Oh, okay. Fair enough.

Speaker 1 28:27

No, it's like if you were in the 1983 and you designed a case for your Samsung Galaxy or your iPhone.

Speaker 2 28:36

Yeah.

Speaker 1 28:37

Everybody looked at you and said, what the hell's that for? It's useless. Anyway, but Neil, for all this build and sending off to Paris and being brought back to the British Royal Navy and building a special balloon house for it. She had never been fully tested.

Speaker 2 28:54

Well that's bloody ridiculous, isn't it? They should do that before they do anything else. It's like changing a tyre. You want to make sure that the it's all inflated before you bloody do anything else, don't you? Idiot.

Speaker 1 29:03

What could go wrong though? A giant silk sheet infled with hydrogen, and the first time anyone in the world would attempt such a long distance journey and all over uncharted terrain. I can't see anything going wrong there. Oh! Oh, oh, oh. And did I mention that S.A. Andrée had only begun flying hot air balloons five years prior to this? So there's not really much experience. He took his first flight in 1892 with an experienced balloon captain called Francesco Setti. Francesco Setti? I presume it was Welsh for the name, what that? He then got so excited he wanted his own balloon, and with a little assistance from a public science fund, he bought one named Sphere and went on to complete just nine flights, a little over forty hours and short of a thousand miles. And that was it. His entire experience. It's like having a couple of driving lessons and then starting on the grid at the Monaco Grand Prix. Hmm. Anyway, as it stood, the plan was simple. Andrée and his crew would take their balloon along to a specially chosen set of Norwegian islands, which were located a mere six hundred and fifty of your miles away from the North Pole, and launch for their destiny on a summer's day in 1896.

Speaker 2 30:24

That's a good idea.

Speaker 1 30:25

The two crew members joining Andrée were meteorologist Niels Eckholm and a physics professor, Niels Strindberg. S.A. Andrée had refused to change his name to Niels for the duration of the expedition. Should have made a bit easier, wouldn't it?

Speaker 2 30:43

Well, I suppose, but then it would be like Niels, Niels? Yes, Niels, Niels. Two means.

Speaker 1 30:49

Niels, if you pulled in the guide rope. Not you, Niels, I meant Niels. Yes. What Neils? Niels, have you cooked the dinner? What? No, nothing Niels. Just put in the guide rope. No, you Neils. Yes, I suppose you're right. You can see these things coming.

Speaker 2 31:04

Yes.

Speaker 1 31:04

But oh no, Neil.

Speaker 2 31:06

What?

Speaker 1 31:07

Oh no. What now, please? Oh no, Neil. What? Several days of bad weather caused the flight to be delayed by weeks, and in the end they each agreed to abandon the plan and reconvene for the summer of eighteen ninety-seven.

Speaker 2 31:23

Wow, so they said no, we can't do it, let's have a year off.

Speaker 1 31:26

Oh no, Neil.

Speaker 2 31:28

Hmm.

Speaker 1 31:29

Oh no.

Speaker 2 31:31

Go on, why? Did someone say no, let's go for it?

Speaker 1 31:34

Oh no, Neil. What? When it came around again, the meteorologist Neil Eckhone refused to return.

Speaker 2 31:45

And he backed out.

Speaker 1 31:47

He said that after what he'd witnessed in 96, he didn't believe the plume would be able to retain the hydrogen needed to complete the trip. The bloom's silk panels had been stitched together by hand, and around eight million tiny holes in the stitching was slowly letting the gas leak out. And by Eckholm's calculations, Warner would lose about sixty-eight kilograms of levate here every twenty-four hours, and she would only be able to stay aloft for 17 days, not for the 30 days required.

Speaker 2 32:22

Right.

Speaker 1 32:22

So why did they take the balloon up? Well, that's a very good question. Andrée was quick to poo-poo the very notion and threw plenty of shade on that comb's name, while secretly topping the balloon up with gas so it didn't appear to be leaking anywhere as much.

Speaker 2 32:38

Well, that's a bit silly.

Speaker 1 32:39

In fact, Andrée didn't like anybody, M E Bud D, to criticize his expedition, even when New York's the Albany Express newspaper wrote, How the men expect to protect themselves from the cold is not even suggested. It is impossible to shield the frail power of a balloon from the intense cold of the open air.

Speaker 2 33:05

Makes sense.

Speaker 1 33:06

But why would Andrée listen, Neil?

Speaker 2 33:09

Um because he was a git.

Speaker 1 33:14

One reason was that in between the 1896 attempt and the planned second launch, Andrée's beloved mother unexpectedly passed away.

Speaker 2 33:25

Oh no, that's a mysterious girl.

Speaker 1 33:28

So how do you feel now about calling him a bit of a git?

Speaker 2 33:32

Um I stand by my decisions.

Speaker 1 33:36

He was a bachelor, obsessed with ballooning and his mission, and Mingna was the only person he had in his life. Suddenly, the all-num was no longer about him, about Sweden, or even Discovery. It was about her memory and making her proud. Or maybe there were other reasons. It is reported that Andrée wrote of her death. The only thread which bound me to the wish to live is cut off.

Speaker 2 34:02

They worded things a lot nicer back then, didn't they?

Speaker 1 34:05

So was he pushing towards suicidal, had to take other people along with him? We don't know. And walking blindly into all this came a new eager volunteer, an engineer in his mid-twenties called Knut Frinkle. Called what? Knut Frinkle.

Speaker 2 34:24

Like that.

Speaker 1 34:26

Good name in it.

Speaker 2 34:27

Yeah.

Speaker 1 34:29

For weeks the newly formed three man crew, Andréei Frinkle and Stringberg, attorneys at law, waited for a southernly wind, praying they wouldn't have to skip another year. But then it came, Neil.

Speaker 2 34:42

Who did?

Speaker 1 34:43

A big stiffy.

Speaker 2 34:44

The big stiffy.

Speaker 1 34:45

A big stiff roaring gale blowing directly toward the pole.

Speaker 2 34:50

Ooh, so it's perfect then.

Speaker 1 34:53

The station was drilled for a quick launch, and when Andrée gave the command, cut away to the factory. And when Andrée gave the manly command Cut Away.

Speaker 2 35:09

Which in Swedish is cut away. Which is cut away.

Speaker 1 35:13

Is it?

Speaker 2 35:14

Yeah.

Speaker 1 35:14

I don't believe that. Support crew sprinted forward with knives, slicing thick held ropes, the giant wooden hangar doors ripped open, and the wind caught with magnificent ornament. What happens next takes less than two minutes, but is one of the most agonizing sequences in the history of all exploration. As the varnished silk balloon cleared the hangar, the fierce Arctic wind slammed into it. Instead of shooting up into the sky, Ornan was forced downwards. The heavy whisker basket plummeted towards the grey icy water of the bay. The onlookers on the beach screamed The basket struck the churning surface of the ocean and slapped across the waves like a skimmed stone. Salt water splashed over the sides, threatening to pull the three explorers down into the freezing depths. The men began throwing baskets of ballast over the side, sand and iron fillings raining down into the sea. The balloon groaned, fought against the downdraft, and slowly, miraculously clawed her way back up into the air. On the shore, the hollow fied shrieking from the crowds had turned to cheers.

Speaker 36:24

Good show. Jolly good show.

Speaker 1 36:27

But those who knew looked down at their feet on the gravel beach, and their blood ran cold. Especially for this expedition, S.A. Andrée had turned his mind to a great invention. He knew balloons couldn't be steered, so his thought was to attach three massive heavy ropes, each weighing a third of a ton to cascade down from the basket and drag along the ground or the ice. By acting as a shifting weight and anchor, these ropes would allow him to steer the balloon using sails. This way. But when the basket hit the water, the extreme friction did something unthinkable. The screw joints holding the ropes together twisted. On the beach, the ground crew realized the truth. All three of the heavy guide ropes had detached and were now washed up. Within moments of taking to the air and well within sight of land, Ornan had lost its steering mechanism. It had also just lost hundreds of pounds of ballast and is now completely at the mercy of the wind, floating far too high and leaking precious hydrogen gas into the atmosphere. The crew on the shore began shouting, pulling their caps on their heads and waving them frantically for Andrée to pull the valve, release the gas and abort the flight. Surely he sees the ropes on the beach, surely he knows he's flying a broken balloon into a frozen void. But everyone is waving and cheering, and Andrée doesn't pull the valve. Whether it's pride in experience, the immense pressure of global expectation or pure adrenaline, he simply leans over the edge of the basket, waves his cap to the crowd, and shouts a final goodbye. Sure. That was it. Then the wind scoops them up and carries them north. Within minutes the giant white silk dome becomes a tiny dot against the great Arctic clouds before it vanishes entirely.

Speaker 2 38:29

It's gone. Yeah. Like that. Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 1 38:32

Now Neil, if you'd like to check your watch, you'll find it's August the fifth, nineteen thirty. Now Neil, if you'd like to check your watch, you'll find it's August the fifth, nineteen thirty, please.

Speaker 2 38:44

Mine says August the fifth, nineteen thirty.

Speaker 1 38:47

Good. Well then, thank you. That carries on the show Biz Illusion, you see. Thirty-three years since anyone had seen Andrée, Frænkel, or Stringberg. Now the Bratt Vag sealing expedition had just fought their way to the near impassable White Island and hoped to reap the benefits of its untapped ceiling opportunities. I wouldn't have thought there'd be many buyers for overhead interior surfaces that cover the upper limits of a room, but there you go. What they didn't expect to find on the island, however, were the dismembered and frozen remains of a long lost amateur balloonist and his crew.

Speaker 2 39:28

That'd be a bit worrying.

Speaker 1 39:30

But there, stripped of flesh, was half of S.A. Andrée, leaning up next to a rock. His torso had been eaten by polar bears sometime in the past thirty years. The corpses of Frænkel and Stringberg were found not too far away. Stringberg was probably the first to die because he had been buried beneath rocks, but now his body was dug up and partially eaten by these polar bears. Despite being nothing more than partial skeletal remains, all three could be identified because their shirts had their names and their initials monogrammed into them. That's why Mum always used to say you used to sew that little name tag into the back of your shirt and swim entrance at school. She was right, see. As to how they died, people have speculated lead poisoning from the lead laced cans of food, botulism from contaminated food, scurvy, maybe suicide, polar bear attacks, or most likely of all, the crew were hunting and eating polar bear and seal only to develop trichinosis, and that's a particularly horrible way to go out. Weak starving and out of other options, Andrée suggested that they eat bear meat raw, which apparently tasted like oysters, and they also hunt on the ice with their firearms and eat what they could. We know they made blood pancake from bear's blood and oatmeal, which they fried in butter. I know, but Stringberg won that year's edition of Master Chef with his soup made from algae he'd scooped up from the water, or Velute de la Mer, a silky emulsion of wild harvested Arctic greens. He wrote it on the menu. Any of that could have gotten them without even mentioning they were stuck out in the freezing bloody cold, of course. And how do we know all this, please?

Speaker 2 41:27

Because uh you've read it out.

Speaker 1 41:29

Because the Norwegians recovered the bodies and found the men's preserved journals, as well as the incredible find of Stringberg's intact expedition camera with its film negatives. Stringberg, bless him, didn't stop recording the journey with his camera right up until his death. There were over two hundred images, but only ninety-three have been restored since the remains of the expedition were found. As for the journals, Andrée noted the technical details of the journey, their food stocks, their geographic positioning, and the mood amongst his crew. Frinkel concentrated on recording observations of the weather, while Stringberg was more personal and reflective. The positivity noted at the beginning of the journey stuck with them until the end, as they described the beauty of the snow and ice, the polar bears and Arctic skies, as well as their optimism of making it back home. But that would take over thirty years thanks to a Norwegian expedition. Instead, the crew of the Örnen's final home in life was the expedition's base camp they called Mina Andrée's Place.

Speaker 2 42:38

Mina Andrée's Place.

Speaker 1 42:39

That was his mum, wasn't it?

Speaker 2 42:41

I suppose, yeah.

Speaker 1 42:41

They named after his mum. So was he a madman? Was he a bit of a not a bumbling fool, but did he put adventure before practicality? Was he unlucky? Was he a brave adventurer? We don't know. What we do know is he spent thirty years trapped in the ice before anyone found him again. And then he'd been eaten by polar bears.

Speaker 2 43:04

Hmm. Hopefully he was dead before then.

Speaker 1 43:06

Like a human calippo. He was dead before then, yes. He's been dead before.

Speaker 2 43:15

Put him to one side, we'll come back for him later. They perhaps forgot where he was.

Speaker 1 43:19

I I said the head. Someone's eaten the head that had my name on it. Right. Well, thank you, listener, for joining us on today's freezing episode from the Arctic, all about S.A. Andrée and his doomed expedition up and away in its beautiful balloon. If you'd like to hear more stories of history's forgotten heroes, people who should have a bigger place in history than they do have, and maybe you've not heard of them, and you'd like us to bring that story to you, please let us know. Or just subscribe to us wherever you stream your podcast. Please do that, because it helps us, and it's doing us a massive favour if you can leave a review as well, because then it helps us in the rankings and get pushed further and further. Look, the chats. And Neil, would you like to please just tell the listener where they can find us on social media?

Speaker 2 44:18

Yes, Stephen. On social media you can find us on Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, Discord, where we're on Reddit. And where other social media situations are, I suppose. Is there anything you'd like to say to close us off? Thank you for that. And if you do like to tie animal balloons, please send me a dog.

Speaker 1 44:40

Tied to a balloon?

Speaker 2 44:43

No. Dog made out of balloons.

Speaker 1 44:46

Oh, I see. Yes, Lissna, please don't go tie your dog to a helium balloon, expecting it to land in Neil's garden. Well, thank you, Lissner. We'll see you again next week for another episode of Honorable Mentions. Bye. You're gonna say bye.

Speaker 45:04

Bye. Great Scott, what about that story listener? How tragically heroic you might say, if only they had taken a spare flux capacitor. Anyham, thank you for listening to Honorable Mentions and Mario's history. Please, spend some time to do me a big personal favor. Subscribe so you don't miss a future episode, and leave a five-star review if you haven't already. It really helps a small independent public chemist to take on the big boys. Come on, if you put your mind to it, you can accomplish anything. You know, honorable mentions was researched by Stephen Wimb. Poor old Neil. He never knows what they're gonna be talking about until they start talking. Great scum indeed! Am I right? And have you heard that theme tune? That was written and performed by Pepe and the bandits, and you can listen to more of them whenever you stream your music. Now, go forth listener. Subscribe, and we'll see you again next week. And remember, your future is whatever you make it, so make it a good one.